Overwhelmed by all the book on leadership?

So am I.

In writing about many of the books that are published on leadership, Hogan and Kaiser (2005, 171) called many of them “troubadour” literature. They write, “It (troubadour literature) consists of the opinions and score-settling reminiscences of countless former CEOs. These works are high on entertainment value, but are so context specific that it can be difficult to derive defensible generalizations from them.”

I agree with their statement that, “Despite its popularity, the troubadour tradition is a vast collection of opinions with very little supporting evidence; it is entertaining but unreliable.”

I am hopeful tha the books that I present do not fall into this category but instead provide guidance based upon solid research-oriented principles and proof.

So many of those books that seem to fill the business sections of airport bookstores sound enticing but when examining them, they are simply filled with anecdotes. To be sure, books that have too much narrative that is research-oriented or written in more academic terms may turn off most practitioners. There is a need though to find literature that is truly based upon true facts and not simply supposition.

The same applies to leadership. So many thoughts and concepts about leadership are based upon a single person’s viewpoint and although sounding logical or persuasive, may not in fact be supported by reality.

I caution readers to be careful what they read about leadership and be certain that there is good foundational support for the points presented.